


Estranged

by the_human_banana



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, F/M, Lestrange - Freeform, Parent Bellatrix Black Lestrange
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:08:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25543393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_human_banana/pseuds/the_human_banana
Summary: Ascella Katilyn Lestrange was born on a stormy October 15th, 1977 to Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange. From the day she was born, her mother was absent. Off fighting on the wrong side of a war, Bellatrix left her only child in the hands of her dearest sister Narcissa. Ascella barely noticed when she hadn't seen her mother or father for days, and it came as little surprise when her aunt and uncle told her it was because they were in Azkaban.She was raised in the same toxic house that Draco was, but when she finally went off to Hogwarts, she wasn't welcomed as a Slytherin heiress the way that he was. She was shunned due to her name. Her mother's reputation stained that of Ascella's own from the moment she stepped foot into Hogwarts. Plagued by the fact that she is her mother's daughter, Ascella feels like an outcast. It isn't until she meets Hufflepuff Freya Pierce that she feels welcome. Then, she learns that Freya is a Muggleborn. Instead of shunning her only friend, she embraces the concept that Muggleborns are not what she was taught that they were.If it weren't for a heavily desired key, Ascella would have denounced her family name long ago.
Relationships: George Weasley/Original Female Character(s), OC/OC
Kudos: 2





	Estranged

_-prologue-_

I was born on a very stormy October 15th, 1977, an hour before midnight. It had stormed all day and all night, from the moment that my mother went into labor until long after I was born. It had stormed for three days straight.

My uncle used to tell me that it should have been a sign to my mother that I was going to be a problem child; that I would be more trouble than I was worth.

According to my aunt, my mother was overjoyed. She told me that her sister had wanted a child of her own for years, but had many miscarriages, and even stillbirth. For me to be born, full-term, and completely healthy was, to my mother, a miracle. Of course, she thought it was a gift given to her for producing a pure-blooded child from two very old pure-blooded families. She believed that finally having a daughter was the reward for continuing to try, for putting herself through grief to produce a pure-blooded child. Part of her thought that it was made to happen by her beloved master, Lord Voldemort.

My mother never expressed interest in the idea of being a mother. She wanted a child desperately, but she didn't want to be a mother. She said that it was her duty as a pure-blood from the House of Black to produce more pure-blooded children. She believed that it was her mission to ensure that the purity of her family, and her husband's family, continued for another generation. 

She was the furthest thing from maternal, and even my aunt admitted this. 

I had been raised by my aunt from the day I was born. Once my mother recovered from my birth, which was a long and painful process for her, she immediately continued her 'work'. She didn't even try to feed or bond with me. The moment that she could go back to hurting others, she did. My aunt tried to insist that my mother spent a great deal of time with me, doting on and cooing at me, but she couldn't hold that lie for very long. I knew better, I heard the stories of what my mother had done. There was no way she could have spent much time 'doting' on me when she was murdering countless innocent people and torturing countless more. 

Eventually, my aunt told me the truth. 

My mother spent a handful of hours with me in the first six months of my life, and maybe a handful more by the time she was sentenced to life in Azkaban. In the three years, I had been alive before she was sent to Azkaban, she had spent more time with me in her womb than she had spent with me outside of it. Her 9-month pregnancy was essentially the only time we had spent together. I hadn't even noticed that she was in Azkaban until the following Christmas. 

My uncle used to sneer at me and tell me that even my mother was unable to love me. He used to tell me that I was so unlovable, that my own mother chose to spend her life in Azkaban rather than raise me.

I knew that wasn't the truth. It wasn't that I was unlovable, it was that she was incapable of loving me more than she loved hurting others. 

She was so loyal to Lord Voldemort that she considered it an honor to be imprisoned for her crimes. She considered Azkaban nothing more than a place to wait for his return. On the other hand, my uncle Lucius lied to the Ministry and claimed to have been under the Imperius Curse when they questioned him about his actions. 

There was one thing my mother did that I was thankful for.

She created a vault at Gringotts, many years before I was born, for her pure-blooded child to inherit at age 17, so long as they weren't disowned by then. By the time I turn 17, that vault will have existed, entirely untouched, for close to 25 years. Twenty-five years of untouched gold, accumulating more and more, over the years. 

Lucius would have emptied the vault the day that my mother and father were sent to Azkaban had it not been for the fine lines. 

Not even my aunt Narcissa, my mother's dearest sister, had access to the vault. Only my parents, and once I turned 17, only me. This frustrated my uncle, dearly, because he sees me as a burden he was forced to take on because of our relations. 

Not that he has ever financially supported me. Narcissa has always had her own sizable vault, as a daughter of the Noble House of Black, and she has always supported me through that vault. The only thing my uncle has ever done for me has been to allow me to sleep under his roof, and allow me to eat his food. That is, however, entirely because if he didn't, my mother would kill him.

I was born into a long line of Slytherins. 

As the daughter of Rodolphus and Bellatrix Lestrange, there has only ever been one place for me in Hogwarts, and that is in Slytherin. 

Per tradition, I was named after a star. 

Technically, my mother wanted to name me Katilyn - which means pure - but my aunt insisted that they should keep with the Black family tradition, and name me for a celestial object. At first, my mother refused, saying that she was no longer of the Black family, she was of the Lestrange family. 

Clearly, by the time I was born, my mother relented. Narcissa says that she changed her mind when my name was presented to her. When Narcissa suggested the name, days before I was born, and my mother seemed to agree that it was fitting.

My aunt named me Ascella, for the third brightest star in the Sagittarius constellation.

Ascella Katilyn Lestrange.

Being born to such blood-supremacists, anyone would assume I am my mother's daughter. Being raised by Lucius Malfoy, who believes that anyone who isn't himself is the scum of the earth, anyone would assume that I am similarly arrogant and prejudice. 

I will not lie, I was very much what everyone assumed me to be. I was raised in the epitome of an echo-chamber. My uncle spewed so much hatred around me and his son, my aunt never saying a single thing to discredit or disagree. Draco and I were truly raised to believe that we were better than others because of our blood purity and wealth. 

When I was 11 years old, I went to Hogwarts and was sorted into Slytherin. Despite what anyone may believe, I was not sorted there because of the prejudice and malice that lived within my mind, no. I was sorted into Slytherin because of my ambition, my pride, my wits, and my values.

The Sorting Hat said that I would do well in Hufflepuff or Gryffindor. The Hat said I considered loyalty of the utmost importance, that I was kind, and I valued hard work and dedication, but I was impatient and had a temper like my mother. The Hat said that Gryffindor matched me the best, but I had scoffed quietly. At the time, I had thought that Gryffindors were far more pretentious than any Slytherin could dream of being. I thought that only the arrogant, reckless, lazy, and stupidly courageous belonged in Gryffindor. I believed that only those who thought that because they were brave, they were better, belonged in Gryffindor. 

I was far from brave, and I found courage useless. 

If I worked hard and was confident, why would I need to be brave? If I wanted something badly enough, I didn't need to be courageous to go after it, I just needed to want it. 

And I wanted to be in Slytherin. 

I valued hard work and dedication, but I felt that they were useless if there weren't ambitions. I felt that hard work was wasted without ambitions, that dedication was pointless otherwise. 

Gryffindors ran into their problems head first, without any sort of critical thinking. They didn't consider the consequences of their actions. They didn't think of what their actions could cause, what the implications of their decisions could be. 

To me, deciding in haste was an awful idea. It was dangerous, reckless, and just ignorant. Putting oneself, and potentially loved ones, in danger because it just seems like a good idea is nothing more than ignorance. Bravery meant nothing if one wasn't careful, calculating, and smart about it. 

Being the most courageous person meant nothing if one died because of a mistake that could have been avoided by simply weighing the consequences, and other options. 

It meant less if someone else died. 

Self-preservation was necessary, without it, one makes reckless and dangerous decisions simply because one can. 

So, I was sorted into Slytherin after several long minutes of silence. 

As every first-year does, I received applause from my house, but as I went to sit down, I noticed something that was quite heartbreaking. 

Not a single student looked at me, not a single classmate smiled to me, not a single person in that room met my eye. Narcissa had warned me that people would look at me strangely because my mother did _awful_ things. She hadn't warned me that people would refuse to look at me, that when I passed someone, they purposely turned their heads away from me, their eyes wide. 

She had not warned me about the fear in their eyes when they did so. 

The fear is what got to me. I was an eleven-year-old child, and I was nothing but kind to those that I interacted with, yet they always looked so afraid of me. 

I knew that the Black family had a history of extreme tempers, and I knew that I had a temper, but I had given none of my fellow Slytherins a reason to be afraid of me. I had given them no reason to silence themselves when I approached, to look at their feet when I looked at them. I had given them no reason to fear me. 

By my twelfth birthday, I realized they feared me because they feared my mother. They knew her reputation, _the_ most notoriously evil Death Eater, and they assumed I was like her. 

Christmas came around, and I had made no friends. I decided to stay at Hogwarts for the break, hoping to find someone that, maybe, wasn't so afraid of me. 

Turns out, the only people who weren't afraid of me were the Muggleborn students who had no idea who my mother was. For a few days, I struggled with the idea that to have a friend, I needed to befriend a Muggleborn, but then I met her. 

Freya Pierce was the best thing that ever happened to me. 

I was sitting in the library, sulking over just how alone I felt when she approached me. She sat beside me and smiled widely. 

She introduced herself, and I learned that she was in Hufflepuff. I introduced myself with just my first name, just in case, and she learned that I was in Slytherin. We chatted for a short while before she mentioned the whole fear thing. 

Freya said that her friends discouraged her from coming to talk to me, that they said I was a rotten egg, but she hated seeing how sad I was. She had wanted to talk to me for months, but she had never gotten the chance before that morning. Freya admitted that she read articles about my parents, but that she knows, firsthand, that not everyone is like their parents.

I asked what she meant by knowing firsthand, and she went quiet. 

After a while, she told me that her father had murdered her mother when she was a toddler, that he had been serving a life sentence since then. 

I asked if he was in Azkaban, and she went quiet again before she told me that her father was in a Muggle prison, since both he and her mother were Muggles. 

For a long moment, I was quiet. Freya had this look of fear on her face, but it wasn't because of who I was. It was because of what the typical Slytherin belief was; Muggleborns weren't worthy of Hogwarts and were scum because of their blood.

I cannot lie and say that it didn't bother me. I had been raised in an environment that breeds that kind of hatred like weeds. My entire childhood, up until that moment, I had believed what my uncle told me. I had believed everything that he insisted was true. Even at that moment, I couldn't help but feel that little bubble of disgust and hatred. 

But Freya was so kind.

And I'd seen her in my charms and transfiguration classes. She was as capable of the magic as I was; even better. She had better marks than I did in Charms. 

That's what sealed the deal for me, to a degree. 

If Freya - a Muggleborn - was better at charms than I - a Pure-blood - was, then we weren't so different, were we? 

So, I shrugged it off and asked her if she had any other family. 

Freya had smiled widely before she delved into how she lives with her aunt and uncle with her younger brother. She spewed about her younger brother also being magic, and how she truly believes that her father - raised in Orphanages - was a Squib.

The more she talked about her family, the more I realized how messed up my own was. 

My uncle Lucius never showed the tiniest bit of affection for any of his family, and more often than not, treated us like absolute garbage. Even his own son wasn't good enough for any sort of affection or pride. He never even kissed his wife. He frequently verbally degraded me, Draco, and Narcissa and had done so for many years. 

I couldn't remember a single time that he was kind, in any way. 

So when she told me about how her aunt and uncle were unbelievably sad when they had to say goodbye to Freya, I couldn't help but frown and look away. 

She asked what was wrong, and I told her the truth. 

My uncle had dropped me in front of the station and forced me to find my way to the platform. I hadn't even known that I had to run through a wall until a kind ginger woman instructed me on what to do. 

Freya expressed sympathy and asked how my relationship with my younger cousin was. 

We continued to chat for a couple of hours before one of her friends came around the corner and informed us that it was dinner time. I walked with Freya, and we parted ways when we entered the Great Hall.

I told her that it was nice to meet her and that I would love to hang out again sometime, and she expressed the same feeling. 

For the rest of the holidays, Freya spent most waking hours with me, introducing me to her many friends. The more time I spent with her, the more comfortable I became with the fact that she's Muggleborn. By the time the holiday was over, I realized how uncomfortable I had been when we met, and how comfortable I was. 

By the end of the year, I had far more friends than I had at the beginning. 

Most of them were Muggleborn.

I was very openly friends with them, and I never denied knowing that they were Muggleborn. I hadn't thought that decision though, as it sort-of alienated me from my own house. However, as much as it alienated me from Slytherin, it ingratiated me with the other houses. 

Gryffindor house, pretty much as a whole, was adamant about continuing to hate me, but I wasn't bothered by it. I didn't particularly want to be friends those arrogant prats, who almost unanimously acted as though they rode on higher horses than the rest of us. Granted, some of them were decent, but most of them drove me crazy.

I knew that Gryffindor could say the same for Slytherin, but at least we were aware of how we rubbed the other houses wrong. Gryffindor acted innocent in everything, and more often than not, _they_ were the instigators. 

At least, it was like that until Draco and Harry Potter started their war. 

I couldn't say that I was innocent in the whole enemy thing. I had - somehow - rubbed a handful of classmates the wrong way, and unintentionally made some enemies of my own. 

When I was in my early third year when I got the letter from aunt Narcissa. 

Apparently, one of my fellow Slytherins - probably one of Draco's cronies - had told one of their parents that I was, knowingly, friends with _several_ Muggleborns. From them, my uncle had found out about my treacherous actions, and threatened to disown me for being a blood-traitor.

Narcissa informed me that if that happened, I would lose the Gringott's vault that I was due to inherit in just 4 more years. 

The way that she worded it is the only reason I made the decision I did. 

_Four years, Ascella, and you will have unrestricted, irrevocable, and complete control over that vault. That vault, which my sister put a load of wealth into, which has been untouched, accumulating even more wealth, for 20 years. Surely, being so carelessly open about your friends is not worth losing such a thing. Surely._

So, I talked to my friends. At that time, I had nine. 

Five of them were Muggleborn. Freya, a fellow third year in Hufflepuff; Allison; a fellow third year in Hufflepuff; Edna, a fourth year Ravenclaw; Amelia, a fourth year and my only Gryffindor friend; and Poppy, a second year Slytherin. 

Poppy had become a little sister to me, and I adored her dearly. Her status as a Muggleborn is only known to our friend Claudia; a fellow Slytherin in my year. She had transferred to Hogwarts from Ilvermorney that year and had immediately been floored to learn of the toxic environment that our house created for students like Poppy.

When Claudia learned that Poppy was a Muggleborn, she and I decided that no matter what, we would stop at nothing to keep that information from getting out. We went as far as to say that she and Claudia - a pureblood - were cousins. That Poppy's parents died when she was young, which was true, and that Claudia's parents hadn't heard of the accident until it was too late to take her in. Nobody questioned it, and nobody dug any deeper into it. 

Claudia's parents knew about the lie and completely supported it. 

She was the only Muggleborn that I didn't have to start a secrecy pact with. Freya was down for it before I even finished explaining; she knew how awful my uncle was. Edna was insulted that I felt the need to hide our friendship and almost made me chose between being her friend or the secrecy. 

But, once again, Freya saved the day. She told Edna about how terrible my uncle was, and how much I needed that vault if I was going to disown myself when I turned 17. 

Edna gave in and agreed to keep it a secret. 

Amelia was welcoming too, though she tried to talk me into just being open and telling my uncle to screw off. I explained that, as tempting as that plan was, it would screw me over in ways she would never understand. So, she too agreed. 

Allison, however, refused to be a secret. She told me that I was an arrogant bitch - her exact words - and that if I was so ashamed to be her friend, then she wanted nothing to do with me. 

That became my first unintentional enemy. 

And my first heartbreak. 

I had liked Allison, but I hadn't known that she was so prideful. I guess being treated the way that she had been her entire life makes a person sensitive to that kind of thing. Her mother left her and her father when Allison was young because she thought her daughter was a freak. 

When she got her Hogwarts acceptance letter, and a visit from McGonagall, her father was relieved to know that she wasn't a freak. Her mother refused to see Allison as anything else, and when her brothers learned what she was, they took their mother's side. The only person in her family that didn't see Allison as a freak was her father. 

Her mother went as far as to tell her parents that Allison had died in a car accident when she went off to Hogwarts. 

I should have known better than to approach the topic with her the way that I did. Allison felt that I wanted to keep her a secret because I was ashamed of her, not because my abusive and murderous uncle threatened me. 

She wouldn't give me the chance to explain, and so I had to let her go. 

The other four people that I was friends with consisted of three more Hufflepuffs and Claudia.

Cedric and Emily were both pure-blood, and Dawn was a half-blood. Her father was pure-blooded, while her mother was half-blooded with a half-blood father and a Muggle mother. 

Nobody even knew Dawn's blood status, because if one wasn't Muggleborn, they didn't ask. 

The moment that people hear that someone is Muggleborn, it's hard to keep it quiet. However, when people hear that someone is half-blood, it just stays quiet. Nobody cares if someone isn't pure-blooded, as long as they aren't Muggleborn.

Lucius would have urged me not to be friends with her, but he wouldn't disown me over it. The vast majority of the Wizarding World consisted of half-bloods. 

To Lucius, and my parents, that was a crime. 

The longer that I was at Hogwarts, the more I realized how bloody stupid the whole idea of blood purity was. The closer I got to my friends, the more I realized that it didn't matter at all what someone's blood was like. The more time that I spent with Freya, the more I realized that not being Pureblooded does _not_ mean that her blood was muddy. Unclean.

She was not a mudblood. 

None of them were.

I had never used the word to describe another person, and I never would. Maybe if I had never had that change of mindset, maybe if I had continued to believe that Muggleborns were scum, maybe then I would have.

But I had never used it, and I never would.

If I had it my way, if I wasn't plagued by the desire for that Gringott's vault, I would be far more proactive in preventing my fellow Slytherins from using the word. I would have been far less tolerant of Draco using the word, but what could I do?

I trusted Draco, as even when the whole school believed that I unfriended the Muggleborns that I had been friends with - sold by the argument that Allison instigated - my cousin knew the truth. 

He had come to me after that argument, this expression of pure concern on his face, and swore to me that he didn't tell Lucius about my friends. He said that while he wished I wouldn't stoop that low, he understood my reasonings. When he nearly started to cry, promising that he would never have put me in danger like that, I told him the truth. 

Draco was relieved, even more so when I told him that Narcissa had told me that one of Lucius' close friends - likely Goyle's father - had told him. I insisted that I had never thought it was Draco, and then he asked why I wanted to be friends with the Muggleborns that I was friends with.

So I told him about how alone I was in my first year. 

Everyone had been _so_ afraid of me because of my parent's reputation. They had all thought that I was going to be as sadistic as my mother, and so they stayed away. I told him that I had no friends until Freya sat with me in the library. 

I told him that she was my first friend, and even though she's Muggleborn, she's kind and just as much of a witch as I am. He quietly listened as I told him that the only people who were not afraid of me were Muggleborn. Even the ones who had heard from their friends about who my parents were. They - specifically Freya and Edna - had seen how kind I was to anyone who gave me the chance to be kind, and they went out of their way to try to get to know me. 

They went out of their way to prove to the rest of the school that I wasn't a rotten egg. 

Of course, Gryffindor didn't care. Once they had their impression of me, they kept it. 

Draco's lip had curled just a bit at my clear dislike for the Gryffindor students in my year. Most of them were quite bloody rude to me, and I had never done anything wrong.

My cousin then reminded me that I was the 'best' Slytherin beater, and had been a large reason that Gryffindor lost the Quidditch cup last year. I rebutted that I was certainly not the best, and insisted that I was the only one who played fair. 

It made no sense that Angelina Johnson despised me more than anyone else on our team when I was the only one who didn't cheat. I never fouled another player, and I never purposely went out of my way to hurt someone on the other team. For a Beater to not hurt the opponent team was a very strange thing. 

My whole position focused on trying to knock the other team off of their brooms. My Quidditch team captain, the disgusting, despicable Marcus Flint hated the way that I played, but he knew that I was vital. 

Instead of aiming _for_ the body of the flier, I aimed for their hands. Whenever Angelina, for example, seemed to get into a position to catch the quaffle from Katie, I would hit a bludger that would knock the quaffle away from her, and typically to one of my chasers. 

Even Fred and George Weasley - the Gryffindor beaters - aimed for the body. The number of times that I had to knock a bludger away from one of my chasers that could have seriously hurt them was uncountable. I simply could not count the number of times that the twins had nearly injured my teammates or myself. 

And I had never been anything but kind to them. 

I even stopped Draco from bullying their younger siblings, on several occasions. My cousin was always annoyed, increasingly so the older that he got, but he never told his father. 

So while I always played fairly, no matter how hard Flint pushed me to play unfairly, I took a specific pleasure in bothering the Weasley twins. Towards the end of our second year, the first year that we were on the Quidditch team - Slytherin won the cup, by the way - I was already sick of how they played. Neither of them ever cheated, but they didn't quite play fairly. One of them always targetted Slytherin's seeker, the other always targetted the weakest Chaser. 

They always tried to take out our weakest link, and our most needed teammate. They rarely succeeded, and even when they did, they still lost.

So, every time Gryffindor played Slytherin, I'd stay annoyingly close to the twins, buzzing around them and immediately blocking any Bludger they hit. I knew it was frustrating, but it was completely fair, as the Ravenclaw Beaters often did the same thing to whoever they were playing.

It was a little obnoxious, but I found it hilarious.

The twins approached me after the Gryffindor vs. Slytherin game in our fourth year - the second year with Harry as Gryffindor's Seeker, and the first year with Draco as Slytherin's Seeker.

That game was a particularly awful one - as I was beyond annoyed with the entirety of my team, especially Draco, for the way they treated the Gryffindor team when Snape gave us special permission to train Draco. The note wasn't forged, but I had been sent in to practically coerce Professor Snape to sign it.

Apparently, Marcus assumed I would _seduce_ our Potions professor, and was _disappointed_ that I didn't.

Pig.

Anyway, I was already annoyed, but I was unable to release that anger. Halfway through the game, I noticed that Fred and George were practically coddling Harry Potter. 

And I only noticed when I weakly aimed, and hit, a bludger towards one of their Chasers; and it hit her. She wavered on her broom and dropped the quaffle. That was one of the few times that I had ever hit a flier in the body; the bludger hit her shoulder. 

I noticed that the other bludger was harassing Harry - consistently - causing the twins to _need_ to be around in case the bludger got too close.

The weirdness of how everything seemed to be trying to harm Harry, first he was locked out of the Platform, and then this? That mixed with how suspicious my uncle Lucius was acting... I was concerned that Lucius had managed to curse the bludger to attack Harry. So, when Oliver Wood finally called a time-out, I went over to their team to second the twin's report that the bludger was not acting normally. 

I received extreme glares from the entirety of that team, and my team sneered at me too, but I walked over there and quietly told Wood what I saw.

"The second bludger, which Madame Hooch is currently having to body block, is fixated on Potter. It has not left his trail the entire time that it has been in play, and it is being incredibly aggressive."

"That's just because you keep hitting it-"

"I have not hit that Bludger once this entire game," I snipped at the Chaser that I had un-purposely hit. She glared at me, opening her mouth once more before I raised a hand to her and smirked softly, "And, I could have hit that Bludger at you _a lot_ harder than I did, you should be thanking me."

"You Slytherin bi-"

Angelina Johnson did not like me and never had, but this seemed to seal the coffin of hatred. 

She was the second person that I had unintentionally made an enemy of, and it was because I had flirted with the same Ravenclaw she had flirted with, and I didn't know it.

At least, that's what he told me when we started dating. That only lasted two weeks, at the end of our second year, but it seemingly had a larger impact on people that weren't involved in any way than it did on me or him.

I walked away before she could finish her sentence, leaving the Gryffindors to figure out what to do about that bludger.

"What were you telling them?"

"I was warning them that there was a rogue Bludger targeting their Seeker."

"Why would you do that? That's good for us."

"It's also incredibly immoral, and a complete arse move, Marcus," I rolled my eyes as he scowled at me. He seemed to want to say something more, and so I raised an eyebrow, "Anything you want to tell me?"

"You are the worst."

"Oh, Marcus, you know I'm not."

"I hate you."

"You don't," I snickered as I gently shoved his shoulder, gritting my teeth. "Your team would be nothing without me."

" _My_ team would be fine without you."

"Try that again, and this time, remember who gave that broom before you continue to make a fool of yourself."

With every word, I felt angrier and angrier with the world. I hated myself more and more - this was not who I was. 

Throwing my Uncle's'power' in people's faces was the thing I disliked doing the most.

But that was the part that I had to play. That Christmas break, Narcissa informed me that Lucius believed that I was being dishonest about my beliefs and loyalty. She told me that I was too openly against everything that I was against and that if I wasn't more careful - if I didn't play my part better - I would lose the vault.

So I fell further into the trope. 

Snotty, conceited, selfish, manipulative, and uncaring.

I acted more like Draco's cousin than I had ever acted, and I hated it more than anything in the world. Forcing myself into a box that I didn't fit into, and forcing a label onto that box that didn't fit me, was exhausting. It was mentally exhausting, and it was just bloody awful. I hated pretending to be someone that I wasn't.

But I now had plans for that vault money. 

And every time Draco said, "My father will hear about this!" I had to resist the urge to smack him in the back of the head. Draco was spineless, and I worried he would always rely on Daddy's money and influence to get out of trouble. I worried that he would never become his own person, that he would always force himself to be the son that Lucius desired. I worried that he, just as I, was pretending to be someone that he wasn't. I worried that he felt he had no support to be himself; that he would never find out who he really is.

I did not want that for him.

After that game - which Gryffindor won at the cost of Harry breaking his arm - the Weasley twins approached me as I helped Madame Hooch clean the stands. 

It was a post-game ritual for me. I had started doing it halfway through my second year, and I just never stopped. Whenever asked, I always said that it was a great post-game cooldown. It lowered my adrenaline levels and gave me a clearer mind. 

In reality, I did it to avoid the rest of my team - whether celebrating or pouting.

So, there was no surprise that they knew where to find me.

I was picking up garbage under the stands with my wand when they ducked under the tapestry and greeted me.

"Oi, you."

"I have a name."

"Okay, oi, Lestra-"

"I'd prefer 'you' over that, actually."

"Okay, oi, you."

I rolled my eyes. These two were infuriating, and they always have been. I resisted the urge to jab the one closer to me with the pointed end of my wand, "What do you want?"

"Why did you try to help Harry with the bludger?"

"Because I didn't want to see him get killed by a rogue, likely cursed, bludger?" I replied, turning away from them. Right after the bludger hit Harry and broke his arm, I knocked it away from him. I had hit the bludger as hard as I could, the cursed ball flying to the opposite end of the Pitch. Marcus screamed at me in the locker room, until Draco snapped at him to check his 'disrespect'. I thanked Draco, who admitted he would have done the same thing, which thoroughly surprised me. I did not press. I shrugged as I continued my task, "You'd have done the same thing for Slytherin."

"No, we wouldn't have."

"Then I guess you aren't as chivalrous as you appear."

"Chivalry has nothing to do with protecting cheaters-"

"So if it had been targeting me? Would you have let the bludger knock me off my broom, and likely to my death?" I cut Fred (presumably?) off, turning back to him and scowling, "Would you let a cursed bludger kill me because I'm Slytherin?"

"You're differ-"

"I'm different? How?"

"You don't cheat. You aren't a bully."

"The majority of Slytherin students aren't bullies. The majority of us aren't evil, aren't bad. Aren't prejudice and bigoted," I frowned deeply. At that moment, I had never disliked the twins more. I could name two and a half dozen Slytherins that were just as kind as I was - and a dozen that were far kinder. I furrowed my eyebrows and shook my head, "The majority of us are decent human beings."

"And you?"

"What?"

"Are you evil? Bigoted? Are you a decent human being?"

"Would I be talking to you if I was bigoted?" I deadpanned, staring at George. They were beginning to get on my nerves, and they were stupid to do so. There was nobody around us, I had my wand in my hand, and theirs were in their pockets. I would never do something like that, and I hated that it was as tempting as it was. I took a deep breath and continued to float trash into the big black bag, "Your entire family _is_ considered Bloodtraitors. If I believed in that crap, do you think I'd speak to you? Let alone protect _Harry Potter_?"

"Why don't you denounce those beliefs then?"

"Because if I denounce my family's beliefs, then I get disowned. If I get disowned, I don't inherit the key to my Gringotts Vault, and I am left with literally nothing."

"So you're materialistic and shallow."

"That's quite a reach," I scowled deeply as I stopped picking up trash again. I turned to the twins and glared. I knew their family had financial problems, my uncle was quite cruel to Arthur when we were at Diagon Alley, and he had spoken poorly of the family since I was very young. I knew that Fred and George cared next to nothing for money, but... "I need it."

"For what?"

"Aside from surviving when I am, inevitably, disowned, I need... stuff," I almost said it. Admitting my plan for a large portion of my Gringott's vault would be like reading my diary out loud. It would be like telling these two nearly perfect strangers that I was practically in love with one of my closest friends. It would be unfairly embarrassing, and I refused. I avoided their curious eyes as best I could, "I have plans."

"What kind of plans?"

"The kind that is none of your business."

"Oh, come on!"

"I'm serious. It's none of your business," I insisted quietly. The one that leaned on his left leg with his hands clasped behind him furrowed his eyebrows deeply. The one that stood straight with his arms crossed rolled his eyes and frowned. Suddenly, I realized they were not going to drop it. I hoped that I could at least satisfy their unnecessary curiosity, "I want to open a shop."

"What kind of shop?"

"Again," I frowned when the cross-armed twin smiled widely, "It's none of your business."

"Oh, come on, we're all friends here."

"We are not friends."

"Why not?"

"Because you are obnoxious arses."

"Then we'll leave you alone if you tell us."

"No."

One twin looked at the other, and then back at me. They both smiled, and in unison spoke the worst idea I had ever heard, and the only reason I inevitably told them.

"Then we will follow you around, and tell everyone we're best mates."

I gasped, "Don't do that!"

"Then tell us."

"You're _blackmailing_ me?" I had dropped the bag around the time I called them arses and crossed my arms over my chest in defense. Now, my arms fell to my side and I scowled deeply as I started to border on the side of hysterics. The amount of frustration that these two were inducing was... monumental. I could never accurately describe how much I wanted to shove their heads together, "And you suggested _I_ was the evil one?"

"Not evil, just curious."

"Oh for Merlin's sake, I want to open a joke shop."

The twins fell completely silent as I spoke quietly, with massive reluctance. I had grimaced the entire time that I said it, my heart sinking to the floor. 

What kind of person wants to open a joke shop? 

What kind of witch wants _that_ as their future career?

Fred and George looked at one another, and then back at me. After several moments of silence, I threw my hands in the air and walked away.

"Wait, Ascella-"

"So _now_ you know my name?" I had whipped around, sneered the words, and then returned to storming off. 

"Come on," The twin pleaded as he grabbed my arm. I turned towards him, prepared to slap him across the face. My hand even twitched to raise, but I resisted the urge with everything in me. I had _never_ been violent with another person, and I was not going to let this prat egg that part of me on. That part of me was one that I worked very hard to keep on a very short leash. I was not going to let George Weasley - I think - cut that leash. He didn't notice the twitch, but he did remove his hand from my arm the moment he realized that he had grabbed me, "We didn't know you were into pranks and stuff."

"Who do you think made it to where all of the Slytherin seventh year boys smelled like rotten eggs for a week in our first year? Who else would have turned my cousin's hair pink for a week, and who else would have turned all of the Gryffindor banners puke green after Harry caught the snitch in his mouth?"

" _You_ did all that? The banner thing was bloody brilliant. Not to mention the pure hilarity that the smelly seventh years were."

"Of course I did that," I said, furrowing my eyebrows as Fred moved over to George and I. When George had let go of my arm, I had taken a step back. As Fred approached, I took a second step back. I didn't trust my temper, not with two boys that were as infuriating as these two, "I've been doing that stuff since our first year. I've always done it and I love it."

"We didn't notice."

"Perhaps that's because I don't get in trouble for it."

"Yeah, but you have an unfair advantage - your uncle-"

"I'm just not dumb enough to leave a trail back to me," I scowled. At that point, I worried that my face would freeze into a scowl. It seemed that all I was doing was scowling at these two. What Fred went to imply was far more scowl worthy than most of their previous comments. The meer idea that I genuinely used my uncle's influence was an awful thought. I shook my head softly, trying to lessen my scowl, "Has nothing to do with my family."

"Well, we're friends now," George smiled softly. I wanted to slap him, again, but part of me was, to a degree, a bit excited. My only Gryffindor friend was Amelia, and she always talked about how cool the twins were. How funny they were, and how genuinely enjoyable they were to be around when they weren't getting on everyone's very last nerve. Part of me wanted a friend that shared my enjoyment of jokes, as not even Freya understood. Fred nodded as George smirked gently, "Whether you like or not."

"Did you miss the part about being disowned?"

"We'll keep it a secret."

And they did. Fred, George, and I wreaked havoc on the castle for the next two years, and nobody ever knew. Not a single soul even suspected that I was apart of their pranks, that I was - almost always - the logistical mastermind. 

Throughout those two years, I was able to help Harry whenever I could by giving the information to Fred and George. When Harry was unable to go to Hogsmeade the following year, I gave the twins the Marauder's Map to give to Harry. I hadn't realized how much I would want to help the boy, how much I would want to protect him. 

He had cornered me in the library the weekend after that match and asked why I had done what I had. I pretended not to know what he was talking about, as I had thought I had gotten away with it. 

Apparently, Harry noticed everything that he didn't need to - yet nothing he should. 

During the match, after I had gone to Wood with my suspicions about the bludger, Madam Hooch was unable to secure the bludger in the box. We were forced to continue, and just hope that Harry was able to keep safe.

When he and Draco had gone after the snitch, the bludger followed them under the stands. I knew that if the bludger hit either of them, they could both end up very hurt. I knew what the risks of them being unprotected were, and so - even though Flint was screaming at me - I followed them. I kept the bludger behind me, hitting it back whenever it went to pass me. 

Once we all came out of under the stands, the bludger zoomed past and straight at Harry. He wasn't paying attention, and I knew that if I didn't stop it, it would wreck him. 

So I let the bludger ram the tail of my broom. 

It bounced away as I went into a tailspin, nearly losing control and falling off of my broom. I was just barely able to keep my grip, but as soon as I was steady, the bludger rammed into Harry. 

After he caught the snitch. 

That's when I hit the bludger away from him and helped Madam Hooch wrestle it back into the box. 

I had thought I got away with letting the bludger hit my broom, and to a degree, I did. The twins didn't notice, and neither did a single person on my team. 

He asked why I had let the bludger hit me instead of him, and I shrugged. 

"It's just what I do."

Harry didn't push any further, and I didn't give him another chance to corner me. 

When I gave the map to the twins, I made George - whom I had grown to fancy - swear not to tell him that it was from me. I told him to make something up if he needed to. 

They jokingly asked if I was helping Sirius Black, something they found funny while it simply confused me. 

Until I remembered he was a maternal cousin, to which I laughed. 

After our fifth year exams, I had tripped on my way to dinner and fell down the stairs. It was a nasty fall, and I ended up in the hospital wing for the last few days of the school year. I even needed a follow-up at St. Mungo's to ensure that my injuries - which consisted of a concussion, a sprained ankle, a broken wrist, and a torn muscle in my shoulder - were healing properly. 

While I had been in the hospital wing, I had overheard the drama with Harry Potter and my cousin, Sirius. I overheard that my cousin was actually innocent, that he had truly been James' best mate, and that he had not betrayed James and Lily, that one of their other friends had. The same one that everyone presumed to be dead, and had pretended to be a pet rat for the last twelve years - with the Weasley family. 

It was the first _real_ glimmer of hope that I had that _maybe_ I had a chance to be my own person. 

Sirius wasn't the monster that everyone thought him to be, maybe I could prove everyone wrong as well. Maybe I had that chance after all.

George visited me in the hospital wing the day before we were due to leave Hogwarts for the summer. He had borrowed Harry's invisibility cloak - meaning that Harry knew that the twins and I were friends - to sneak down to see me. 

There, he admitted that he fancied me. 

He didn't want to risk the dynamic that he and I had with Fred, but he couldn't hide from his feelings for me. He didn't want to hide from it, and he just wanted me to know. He felt that by telling me, he was embracing the fact that he was helpless in his feelings. 

He said he was being vulnerable, and I asked who he got that from. 

George feigned innocence before he admitted that he had asked Freya how to tell me that he fancied me. 

Of course, it was Freya. That is the exact same advice she gave me when I asked her how to tell my best friend that I fancied them. Of course, she didn't know that it was her, and while I knew that her advice was valid, I knew I could _never_ tell her. 

As much as I adored her, as much as I fancied her, I knew she would never feel that way about me, and I would rather painfully stew in my feelings that lose her. 

And I had started to fancy George, and while my feelings for Freya had not gone away, I knew that there was zero chance for us. 

So I kissed George.

He had been sitting there, shyly watching me as I thought. He'd been sitting on the bed with me, one leg under him while the other rested on the floor. His entire body was facing me as I sat with both of my legs crossed under me, facing him. 

It was a swift and short moment, and once I pulled away, George smiled like a bloody fool. 

"So, you fancy me?"

I had rolled my eyes and kissed him again. 

Moments later, we heard Madam Pomfrey coming to check on me, so George threw the invisibility cloak around himself and snuck off. 

I wasn't able to see him again before we left for the summer, but I knew that once this summer was over, I would be free. I turned 17 in October, and once I had that vault key, I was free to be who I wanted. I would be free to love who I wanted and to be friends with who I wanted. 

And all I wanted was to be free.

So, George and I wrote constantly, and more often than not, I was gushing about how excited I was for my birthday. 

George always matched my enthusiasm with support.


End file.
